An idea for SOSE II - Custom ships

Probably not relevant but would like to hear some feedback

Well SOSE is a great game merging the core of games like MoO2, GalCiv2, Imperium Galactica, Haegemonia, Homeworld 1&2 into good playable game that looks and feels amazing.

If there is 1 weakness i really regret, its the fact that the ships are just another batch of RTS units instead of what was normal for 4X games.

What i suggest, is for players to have an ship editor to create packages of custom ships. My idea this:

1st) you pick a platform (DD, CL/CA, BC,SD) and the visual model. each platform has different stats: size, cost, speed, acceleration, tonnage, bulding time

2) you put insert abilities,weapons and defense into the platform. You are limited by tonnage and number of slots (so you cant put a fighter bay for instance into a DD. Each component increases cost and build time.

After you create a full package, you save it, and when beginning a game you choose what package you want to use. This would be a SoB pain in the posterior to balance, i know, but would add a depth and customability of a full 4X game like MoO2 (so far the best 4x game ever imho (even better then galciv2 by a small margin (sorry)) while keeping it simple and fast enough for a 4X RTS.

In adition this would allow to create true warships within possibilities. right now, the ships are so specialized, its not really normal. I mean, CA which can be in theory, if given enough time destroyed by 1 bomber squadron, because it lacks even the basic point defense?

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WHIPperSNAPper2008

Join Date 03/2008

+126

It sounds good on paper, but I think players would just end up using the same 4 or 5 different types of ships every game with the only difference being that players would have designed them themselves instead of Ironclad. I found myself doing that in Alpha Centauri, too.

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The problem with custom ships is that most of the games you mention are either singleplayer only or strongly singleplayer biased. This would be extremely unfair and prone to cheese in a multiplayer scenario. The basic problem is that most strategy is about being proactive, predicting what your enemy is going to do and making preparations (this is the biggest flaw in 99% of AI's out there; they just aren't proactive, and as a result, this really doesn't make a difference in singleplayer). If your opponent has a custom unit, you don't know what its capabilities are until you fight it.

For instance, if someone is making a beeline towards your homeworld with two of his customized capital ships, you have to be prepared to counter them. How you go about countering them depends on what they are; prepare for a Sova Carrier and you'll lose your homeworld if that was actually a Vulkoras Desolator. The problem is, you don't know how they specced until it's too late to actually make preparations for the first fight.

Essentially, the problem is that you're giving the opponent a poker hand (the opponent can't see what's there until it's too late to change his decisions) AND you're letting him choose what cards he puts in that hand.

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